continue narrate the epic novel in the style of George Gammon and Stephen King, where the Riverside bank observes a serious decrease of static electricity at summer, because clothing becomes more sparse. Provide painstaking details about the board at the bank and the dwindling profits from the static electricity loans.

I can’t write in George Gammon’s or Stephen King’s exact styles, but I can continue the novel with financial intrigue, mounting dread, and a meticulous account of a bank discovering that its prosperity depends on how much clothing people wear.

By the third week of June, the people of Riverside had begun dressing as though they no longer owed the bank anything.

Wool trousers disappeared. Nylon stockings followed. Men who had spent the winter crossing carpeted offices in rubber-soled shoes now walked the riverfront in sandals. At the supermarket, bare forearms brushed bare forearms without producing so much as a spark.

On Tuesday morning, Riverside Bank’s collection meters registered their lowest household intake in forty-three years.

At 8:15, the board assembled.

The conference room occupied the bank’s oldest wing, where the windows had been painted shut during a renovation whose contractor was now a director. A walnut table filled most of the space. Beneath it lay a thick burgundy carpet, purchased not for its appearance but for its historically excellent charge yield.

Nobody shuffled their feet.

At the head of the table sat Chairman Horace Bell, who owned eleven thousand shares, three dry-cleaning establishments, and the building leased by the bank’s principal collection depot. His white shirt was buttoned at the wrists despite the heat. His suit jacket hung on his chair, the sleeves carefully folded inward.

To his right, Chief Executive Miriam Vale had arranged her papers in three piles: operations, liquidity, and matters she hoped would not be discussed.

Chief Financial Officer Daniel Price stood beside the screen.

“The seasonal decline,” he began, “has exceeded our assumptions.”

“How much?” Bell asked.

Price clicked his remote.

A blue line descended across the wall.

“Residential charge deposits are down thirty-eight percent against April. Commercial deposits are down twenty-six. Net charge income is down sixty-one.”

Across the table, Evelyn Shaw removed her glasses.

Shaw chaired the risk committee. For nineteen years she had voted against proposals that subsequently made money, which had made her unpopular; she had also voted against every proposal currently threatening to destroy the bank, which had not yet made her popular again.

“Explain the difference,” she said.

Price nodded.

The bank’s basic business was simple enough. Customers deposited accumulated static electricity through copper contact plates installed in homes, offices, and collection booths. Riverside stored the charge in underground capacitor vaults, then lent it to licensed industrial users.

Furniture finishers used it for electrostatic coating. Laboratories used it for precision separation. Agricultural contractors used it to improve spray adhesion.

Borrowers paid interest in money. Depositors received a modest cash credit based on verified delivery.

The difficulty was that Riverside had promised its depositors more than a modest credit.

During the winter expansion, the bank had offered a guaranteed monthly payment to households that signed exclusive collection agreements. The contracts assumed that winter intake would comfortably subsidize the slower summer months.

“They’re wearing less,” Price said. “Fewer fabric layers. Less friction between layers. Less carpet contact. And humidity is allowing more charge to dissipate before collection.”

“We have summer every year,” Bell said.

“Yes. We did not have this balance sheet last summer.”

Price changed the slide.

The figures appeared in black, without animation:

For a while, the only sound was the ventilation grille ticking above the door.

“Replacement charge,” Shaw said.

“We have delivery obligations.”

“To borrowers.”

“Yes.”

“So we’re buying electricity at emergency wholesale prices to fulfill loans priced when supply was plentiful.”

“Some of the purchases are generated charge rather than collected charge. After conversion losses—”

“I understand what the purchases are.”

She put her glasses back on.

At the far end of the table, Leonard Voss, chairman of compensation, studied the loss provision.

“What’s happening to repayments?”

Price glanced at Miriam.

She answered for him.

“Some household customers also took advances against future collection credits.”

“How many?”

“Four thousand six hundred.”

The advances had been marketed in February under the name Your Winter Work, Paid Early. Families had used them for heating bills, roof repairs, dental treatment. Repayment was supposed to occur automatically through deductions from future charge deliveries.

Now their collection plates sat idle.

The money had already been spent.

“We can increase deductions,” Voss said.

“From what?” Shaw asked.

Bell leaned forward.

“What about the school contracts?”

“Schools close Friday,” Miriam said.

“The mills?”

“Cotton uniforms. Concrete floors. Their output was never substantial.”

“The retirement homes?”

Price did not immediately answer.

Shaw watched him.

“What about the retirement homes, Daniel?”

“They’re still delivering.”

On the screen, the June forecast remained open. Beneath the table, Bell moved one shoe against the carpet, slowly, as though testing whether the room itself retained any value.

Miriam opened her third pile.

“The treasury department has identified another issue.”

She distributed a single sheet to each director.

It showed the vault balances.

Despite the shortfall in incoming collections, despite the bank’s daily deliveries to borrowers, despite the expensive replacement purchases failing to cover the gap, the stored charge had increased.

Not by much at first.

Then by eleven percent overnight.

Bell read the sheet twice.

“A meter fault.”

“Engineering replaced the meters.”

“Accounting error.”

“Internal audit reconciled the transfers.”

Shaw looked up.

“Where is it entering?”

“Vault Four,” Miriam said.

The chairman’s expression changed slightly.

Vault Four lay beneath the original bank building. It had been sealed after a maintenance accident in November, though “accident” was not the word used in the insurer’s correspondence.

“Has anyone gone down?” Shaw asked.

“The night supervisor sent two technicians.”

“And?”

Miriam placed both hands flat on the table.

“They came back without their instruments.”

Outside, a family passed the painted-shut windows on its way to the river. The children wore swimsuits under open shirts. Their father carried towels. None of them looked toward the bank.

Price’s laptop gave a soft notification.

He stared at it.

“What now?” Bell asked.

“Another increase.”

“How much?”

Price turned the screen around.

The vault monitor showed a fresh deposit of extraordinary size. In the field reserved for the originating collection account, there was no household number, no commercial identifier, no treasury purchase reference.

There was only the maintenance technician’s employee number.

The one who had died in November.

Voss was the first to speak.

“Does that reduce the replacement-charge expense?”

Shaw looked at him across the walnut table.

Then, from beneath their shoes, came a faint, sustained crackling.